§ Lord Glenelg, on moving the second reading of the above-named Bill, very briefly stated its object. The treaty, he said, was one of those measures in which this country had been engaged with a view of carrying into effect the total abolition of slavery. The treaty, the subject of the present Bill, was signed in June, 1835. Another on the same subject, between this country and Spain, was entered into as long ago as 1817; and the Bill which he had now the honour of proposing for second reading was an improvement of that. This treaty extended the latitude and longitude of the former treaty, as to the right of searching vessels suspected of carrying on the slave-trade; it comprehended within it the whole coast of Africa, where it was likely that the trade would he carried on, from 27 degrees north latitude, and 30 degrees west longitude of Greenwich. The Mediterranean had always been excepted from the right of searching vessels. One great improvement which the present treaty embodied over the old one was, that the vessels engaged in the traffic which were captured were all to be broken up. Now, heretofore they had been sold, and it was not unfrequently the case that, after they had been disposed of, they were again employed in the same unworthy trade.
§ Bill read a second time,